Ofcom gives Bulldog the all clear

ISP promises to behave from now on

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Ofcom has closed its investigation into Bulldog after receiving assurances from the broadband ISP that it's introduced a range of measures to improve customer service.

Bulldog has also promised to compensate punters who were with the ISP back in July during the height of the problems.

And the ISP - which is owned by Cable & Wireless (C&W) - has agreed to update Ofcom each month to ensure that it doesn't see a recurrence of the problems.

Ofcom launched an official investigation into Bulldog at the end of August after receiving hundreds of complaints from customers that they had been left without phone and broadband services.

In its statement today Ofcom said it had obtained "detailed information from Bulldog relating to the operation of its business, including details of the circumstances leading to the difficulties some customers experienced during the summer".

"The information Bulldog provided...indicates that Bulldog has implemented a range of steps to improve its customer service operations. Since August 2005, a number of indicators of customer service, such as call waiting times and call abandonment rates, have shown significant improvement.

"Bulldog has also presented evidence to Ofcom demonstrating that it has implemented a number of improvements to both its billing and operational processes."

It went on: "Ofcom is satisfied that as a result of these measures, customers affected by Bulldog's earlier service issues will receive, in aggregate, a material level of credit.

"Ofcom is also satisfied that Bulldog has put in place, and committed to adhere to through the provision of monthly reports to Ofcom, practices to help avoid any recurrence going forwards. Accordingly, Ofcom has closed this investigation."

But Bulldog isn't off the leash yet with Ofcom prepared to re-open the investigation if it receives another spike in complaints about the ISP.

In a statement Bulldog said: "We regret the customer support issues that occurred during summer 2005, which have been addressed. We have implemented a wide range of measures to ensure that we are now able to deliver and maintain a high level of customer satisfaction." ®